Knit Alarm

In this project, we developed a wearable garment for elderly patients to call for help in case of emergency. Our motivation was to create an alarm that could be tailored to the personal preferences of the wearer and provide an unobtrusive and easy mechanism to activate an alarm. The resulting prototype demonstrates two ways of triggering an alarm that are easy but require deliberate action from the wearer. One trigger is integrated in the left cuff, which can be stretched firmly to activate the emergency call. The other trigger is activated by touching the left chest with the right cuff. The knitted cardigan is connected to a smartphone via Bluetooth. Activating one of the textile triggers will cause the phone to initiate a call to a chosen contact.

The Knit Alarm was created in the context of of the BMBF-funded Smart Senior project.

Stretching the cuff triggers the alarm.

LEDs light up if the alarm is triggered.

The appearance of Knit Alarm can be designed according to the preferences of the wearer.